Monday, June 12, 2017

*sigh* Adam West

I reviewed his memoir, Back to the Batcave, when I read it a few years ago. Here's what I wrote:

The memoirs of a man's struggle to be taken seriously as an actor. See him searching for psychological insights into Batman's character before playing him in the camp (West hates that word) 1960s TV series. Yes, really. But what most annoys him is that he's never been asked to play Batman in any of the movies. Points out that he's old enough now (this is 1994, when he was 66) to do the "Dark Knight" role, and he'd play it that way too, he says. Lots of amusing stories of the itchiness of the costumes, the breakdowns of the Batmobile, etc. Repeated avowals that various guest villains were delights to work with are rendered believable by blunt accounts of a few who weren't.

To which I can add that I remember that he specified that the three big repeat villains - Cesar Romero (Joker), Burgess Meredith (Penguin), and Frank Gorshin (Riddler) - were always fully prepared and professional on set, but that it was Gorshin in particular that West made friends with. They'd go off and have a drink together after work.

The fact is that, as a boy, virtually my entire consumption of superhero media consisted of TV shows - the Adam West Batman, re-runs of Superman, and the endless Marvel cartoons of Spiderman, Incredible Hulk, and Fantastic Four that infested the afterschool TV hours. I never read the comic books; I had other things to read. Consequently I was never among those irritated at the Batman TV show for not taking seriously enough the concept of a man fighting crime while dressed as a bat. In fact, I liked the show and West's deadpan straight-arrow portrayal of the righteous hero. Sorry I never saw him in anything else.